“Two halves don’t make a whole,” he said Tuesday night while attending a Manhattan charity gala, The Daily Beast reported. “Two wholes make a whole. In my relationship, I was giving myself away to make the relationship better, but in actuality, wasn’t doing better by doing that. I became less of a man.”

Mraz announced his engagement to 29-year-old Prettyman, a model and singer-songwriter, in December after a longtime romance.

“We are still super friends, we go to yoga together, we surf together. We acknowledge the journey that each of us is on,” Mraz went on. “We certainly want each of us to feel whole and complete. And it’s when you’re whole and complete that that attraction exists and it really thrives.”